heater question

[chicagojeff]

Seems when my heater is on, things are fine...typical 85 degree engine running temp. then, when heater is off, coolant is streaming out of the heater valve, and of course, massive overheating of the engine. Is there a way to fix this (like a new gasket?) or is it just time to replace the control?
thanks for any help!
Jeff

[type36lotus]

hi Jeff, I don't know if they are serviceable. But they can be readily found reasonbly priced on ebay, and I'm sure from the ususal suppliers.

[brassringfarm]

Jeff- The valve CAN be serviced, if I recall its innards correctly, and --new ones on eBay/regular suppliers are inexpensive. It appears as though the valve rubber has disintegrated where it hits the valve seat (just like a faucet washer would) -or- you have crud keeping the washer from seating. I'd bet on 'crud' as the culprit. For me, the challenge was to replace the control in-situ. Because the outer valve body had the cable clamping section which sat relatively far from the valve, when I went to unscrew the full valve assembly, it hit the body. The solution was straightforward: Drill out the pop rivet holding the two halves of the valve together. Then, rotate the outer part of heater valve about 1/12 turn, until the tabs on the circumference of the outer part clear their 'keepers' on the fixed inner part. Then-- the valve just pulls apart quite easily, and you can unscrew the inner part without hitting the body.
As I recall - even if you bought a new one, you'd have to disassemble it to get it on the car. Yes - I know that if you loosen motor mounts and jack up the engine about 3/4" - you don't have to do this. But to me, this was easier than taking out the motor mount bolts in the vicinity of my headers.
Good luck
Paul Zimmerman
65 S2